THE CARD:
Thomas “No Other Credits” Bern, Kim “Loads of Porn” McKamy, Sylvia Summers, Lauren “Saturday the 14th Strikes Back” Peterson, Cynthia Crass, and Michael “Not The Hills Street Blues One” Warren.
More details here.
Adam (Thomas Bern) is a Def Leppard fan who has a randy girlfriend (McKamy, who later became porn star Ashlyn Gere and who's probably the best actress in this movie), writes heavy metal songs, smokes pot, and watches Godzilla movies. So far he’s every dude I know. He also has an unhealthy interest in the black arts and experiments with occult practices which give him nightmares, visions of blood-soaked violence, and an attic infected with seductive female ghosts.
Time to call Orkin.
His girlfriend Pat urges him to get out more often and actually interact with people. So she asks him to help throw a party for her sister Jodi (Peterson) who’s trying to impress bitchy rich girl Frances (Crass) to get her into a sorority. The party guests arrive in a parade of 80s archetypes including Awkward Valley Girl, Feather-Haired Stud Turd, and …
Ahhhh! The Devil!
Oh, it’s just Goofball 80s Guy. AHHHHHH! GOOFBALL 80S GUY!!!!
During the party, we’re treated to such immortal lines such as “Mondo bad planning, Jody. Jeez!”, “AB Positive, that’s my favorite type! (AWKWARD PAUSE). I’m Pre-Med.”, and my fave “I don’t know much about heavy metal. I mean, I’m into Lionel Ritchie.” Meanwhile, Adam continues to be plagued by visions of the ghost woman and in the hopes that she will bring him the success in shitty songwriting he so desires, he performs a ritual to give her new life.
Also, a napkin.
But Adam isn't prepared for the fatal truth that Ghost Girl is actually a succubus, a female demon with a hunger for human flesh and suffering.
And artsy fartsy poses.
Lily the Succubus (Summers) crashes the party with hunky jerk Ace (Warren) and proceeds to smoke the party guests, decorate the walls with brains, and spike the punch with terror.
How not to start a career in party planning.
In the aftermath, Pat and Jodi are last ones standing and must face the horror of an unstoppable she-demon and the wrath of a crazed hair metal fan!
"Where’s my Pyromania LP?!!!"
THE FINISHER:
Director David DeCoteau, a protégé of B-movie legends Roger Corman and Richard Band, is a “friend” of mine on Facebook. I’m not sure if he reads his news feed, monitors posts, tags, or mentions of himself, or even realizes he has an FB account, but I worry that he’ll read this measly review of his early effort Dreamaniac. Beyond personal favorites Dr. Alien and Nightmare Sisters, I’m not well-versed in his filmography but I do know he continually demonstrates his productivity with a long line of director credits spanning a career of over twenty years. And I feel bad trashing one of his works as he’s one of the most entertaining contributors to Joe Dante’s wonderful Trailers from Hell website. But since you are the only person who reads this blog, I feel safe. Hinting at a Freddy Krueger-esque outing with a poster that promises a Clint Howard appearance as a dream killer (see above), Dreamaniac is a shot-on-video piece of poop drenched in the stink of terrible acting, horrendously delivered jokes, high-school drama class sound design, and a total lack of suspense, gore, or coherence. Whew, got that out. But, there may be a silver lining somewhere beneath the torn script pages, non-functioning microphones, and razor-blades dusty with coke. DeCoteau breaks some ground here with a generous helping of male nudity and homo-eroticism something rare to virtually unheard of in 80s teen horror flicks, hell, even now. I’m not saying wieners and white butts saved the movie but we do see here the director’s brave early effort to create a space in horror for other audiences. But any groundbreaking is soon shot to shit by a terrible, seemingly tacked-on ending that puts Dreamaniac into Jacob’s Ladder territory where we discover that somewhere down the line, the movie’s original title may have been Succubus. Well, they got the “suc” part right.
I’m ready for your unfriending, Mr. DeCoteau.
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